Morality in Media

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Morality in Media, Inc. (MIM) is an American non-profit, interfaith organization that was established in New York in 1962. MIM battles pornography and other forms of what it considers obscenity in the media.

Contents

[edit] In the beginning

MIM was first formed by Father Morton A. Hill, Rabbi Julius Neumann, and Rev. Robert Wiltenburg (a Lutheran pastor) as a neighborhood organization under the name Operation Yorkville.[1] They were soon joined by Rev. Constantine Volaitis of the Greek Orthodox Church. Children at a grade school in Manhattan were caught circulating sadomasochistic pornography, and thus, MIM was created.

[edit] Hill-Link minority report

In 1968, Father Hill, a president of MIM until death in 1985, was appointed to serve on the Presidential Commission on Obscenity and Pornography by President Lyndon B. Johnson. A report was submitted in 1970 that said all "adult" obscenity laws should be repealed. Fr. Hill co-authored a minority report describing the Commission's report as a "Magna Carta for the pornographers"[1] with another Commission member, Dr. Winfrey Link. The U.S. Supreme Court recognized the Hill-Link minority report in upholding obscenity laws in 1973.

[edit] Current activism

Under current president Robert W. Peters[2], MIM's current campaigns include:

  • White Ribbon Against Pornography week[3], an apparent attempt to draw on the momentum of the white ribbon campaign against violence against women
  • attempts to restrict the display of magazines such as Cosmopolitan in supermarket checkout lanes because they have sexual references on their covers[4]
  • advising the Federal Communications Commission that swearing on television is harmful to children and causes violence[5]
  • encouraging citizens to take action against pornographic spam[6]

Annual U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) grants of $150,000 in the 2005 and 2006 federal budgets funded MIM's review of citizen-generated obscenity complaints submitted to MIM's ObscenityCrimes.org website. 67,000 of the complaints deemed legitimate under the program had resulted in no obscenity prosecutions as of August, 2007. The grants were created by Congressional earmarks by U.S. Representative Frank Wolf of Virginia,[7] and awarded through the DOJ's Bureau of Justice Assistance, Office of Justice Programs.[8]

[edit] References

  1. ^ Fr. Morton A. Hill, S.J.: Defender of the Public Decencies at the Morality in Media website.
  2. ^ About Morality in Media at MIM site.
  3. ^ White Ribbon Against Pornography week at MIM site.
  4. ^ Morality in Media and American Decency Association call for magazine coverup at supermarket checkout lanes at MIM site.
  5. ^ MIM comments to FCC re [sic] effects of cursing at MIM site.
  6. ^ What can I do about 'porn spam'? at MIM site.
  7. ^ Lewis, Neil A. Federal Effort on Web Obscenity Shows Few Results New York Times, via nytimes.com, 2007-08-10. Retrieved on 2007-08-11.
  8. ^ ObscenityCrimes.org (Nonprofit website). ObscenityCrimes.org, Morality in Media, Inc. Retrieved on 2007-08-11.

[edit] External links